Little Snow Trickster: the Lightning Thief
by artemisdarkmoon
Summary: How would the Lightning thief story turn out if Raven was in the picture? read and find out. warnings: the OC is from the little snow trickster story from my crossover in the Avengers. The story would be in a lightning thief story layout. Raven the Daughter of Apate, goddess of the Mist, illusions, deception, mystery and secrets.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: So this is basically a story about Percy Jackson and how the story would turn out if Raven was in the picture. To those who don't know Raven, she's my OC at my story of Little snow trickster. **

**Read and Review.**

Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.

If you're reading this because you think you might be one, my advice is: close this book right now. Believe whatever lie your mom or dad told you about your birth, and try to lead a normal life.

Being a half-blood is dangerous. It's scary. Most of the time, it gets you killed in painful, nasty ways.

If you're a normal kid, reading this because you think it's fiction, great. Read on. I envy you for being able to believe that none of this ever happened.

But if you recognize yourself in these pages - if you feel something stirring inside - stop reading immediately. You might be one of us. And once you know that, it's only a matter of time before they sense it too, and they'll come for you.

Don't say I didn't warn you.

My name is Percy Jackson.

I'm twelve years old. Until a few months ago, I was a boarding student at Yancy Academy, a private school for troubled kids in upstate New York.

Am I a troubled kid?

Yeah. You could say that.

I could start at any point in my short miserable life to prove it, but things really started going bad last May, when our sixth-grade class took a field trip to Manhattan - twenty-eight mental-case kids and two teachers on a yellow school bus, heading to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to look at ancient Greek and Roman stuff.

I know - it sounds like torture. Most Yancy field trips were.

But Mr. Brunner, our Latin teacher, was leading this trip, so I had hopes.

Mr. Brunner was this middle-aged guy in a motorized wheelchair. He had thinning hair and a scruffy beard and a frayed tweed jacket, which always smelled like coffee. You wouldn't think he'd be cool, but he told stories and jokes and let us play games in class. He also had this awesome collection of Roman armor and weapons, so he was the only teacher whose class didn't put me to sleep.

I hoped the trip would be okay. At least, I hoped that for once I wouldn't get in trouble.

Boy, was I wrong.

See, bad things happen to me on field trips. Like at my fifth-grade school, when we went to the Saratoga battlefield, I had this accident with a Revolutionary War cannon. I wasn't aiming for the school bus, but of course I got expelled anyway. And before that, at my fourth-grade school, when we took a behind-the-scenes tour of the Marine World shark pool, I sort of hit the wrong lever on the catwalk and our class took an unplanned swim. And the time before that... Well, you get the idea.

This trip, I was determined to be good.

All the way into the city, I put up with Nancy Bobofit, the freckly, redheaded kleptomaniac girl, hitting my best friend Grover in the back of the head with chunks of peanut butter-and-ketchup sandwich.

Grover was an easy target. He was scrawny. He cried when he got frustrated. He must've been held back several grades, because he was the only sixth grader with acne and the start of a wispy beard on his chin. On top of all that, he was crippled. He had a note excusing him from PE for the rest of his life because he had some kind of muscular disease in his legs. He walked funny, like every step hurt him, but don't let that fool you. You should've seen him run when it was enchilada day in the cafeteria.

Anyway, Nancy Bobofit was throwing wads of sandwich that stuck in his curly brown hair, and she knew I couldn't do anything back to her because I was already on probation. The headmaster had threatened me with death by in-school suspension if anything bad, embarrassing, or even mildly entertaining happened on this trip.

"I'm going to kill her," I mumbled.

Grover tried to calm me down. "It's okay. I like peanut butter."

He dodged another piece of Nancy's lunch.

"That's it." I started to get up, but Grover pulled me back to my seat.

"You're already on probation," he reminded me. "You know who'll get blamed if anything happens."

Looking back on it, I wish I'd decked Nancy Bobofit right then and there. In-school suspension would've been nothing compared to the mess I was about to get myself into.

"I think you should totally pummel Mean Ariel with freckles over there." My other best-friend, Raven said as she popped up from her seat facing me and Grover, "I could help you murder her if you want. Maybe high five her with a knife? That would be cool."

"No!" Grover said quickly, "we don't want any blood on this trip."

Raven laughed, "too bad. She'd make perfect ketchup for my friends in Canada."

The creepy girl that I just mentioned is Raven Winters. She's this sweet, friendly girl with black hair that was always tied in a messy fishtail braid like she purposely did it or someone did it for her. She had stunning dark green eyes that are either prying open my deepest secrets or solving a puzzle. But sometimes I can't see it because of her long choppy bangs. I find her creepy sometimes because she pulls on dark jokes like she was watching way too much horror films. She also has an unhealthy obsession over strawberry sundeas and would glare at anyone who dares to ask even a small bit of it from her. Despite that she was the friendliest person in school.

"Don't worry Percy. I got this." She gave me her trademark smirk indicating that she was going do something really funny or really mean. I hope it's the latter because she has a habit of poking people in the eyes when she's mad at them. That or throwing water balloons filled with itching powder at random people. I'm sure it was the latter because she was about to get a round object from her bag til Grover stopped her.

So she glared at Nancy instead and then mouthed Murder at her.

Raven's glare is so terryfying that I actually shivered. Nancy finally stopped throwing peanut butter and ketchup sandwich wads.

Raven looked at me and I gave her a thank you look. She winked and said, "your welcome." In return.

Mr. Brunner led the museum tour.

He rode up front in his wheelchair, guiding us through the big echoey galleries, past marble statues and glass cases full of really old black-and-orange pottery.

It blew my mind that this stuff had survived for two thousand, three thousand years.

He gathered us around a thirteen-foot-tall stone column with a big sphinx on the top, and started telling us how it was a grave marker, a stele, for a girl about our age. He told us about the carvings on the sides. I was trying to listen to what he had to say, because it was kind of interesting, but everybody around me was talking, and every time I told them to shut up, the other teacher chaperone, Mrs. Dodds, would give me the evil eye.

Mrs. Dodds was this little math teacher from Georgia who always wore a black leather jacket, even though she was fifty years old. She looked mean enough to ride a Harley right into your locker. She had come to Yancy halfway through the year, when our last math teacher had a nervous breakdown.

From her first day, Mrs. Dodds loved Nancy Bobofit and figured I was devil spawn. She would point her crooked finger at me and say, "Now, honey," real sweet, and I knew I was going to get after-school detention for a month.

One time, after she'd made me erase answers out of old math workbooks until midnight, I told Grover I didn't think Mrs. Dodds was human. He looked at me, real serious, and said, "You're absolutely right."

I even asked Raven about her opinion about Mrs. Dodds and her answer just creeped me out.

"I think you should stab her in the eye with some scissors. That's what I did when I was 5 to my English teacher." She said, looking all serious.

I think she needs to see a shrink or something. Or maybe lay off the horror movies. But Raven agreed that she in fact didn't like Mrs. Dodds, "Stay away from her, Percy. Under no circumstances are you allowed to be alone with her." She warned me.

Her usual cheery and giddy look was gone and was replace by subtle seriousness.

Mr. Brunner kept talking about Greek funeral art.

Finally, Nancy Bobofit snickered something about the naked guy on the stele, and I turned around and said, "Will you shut up?"

It came out louder than I meant it to.

The whole group laughed. Except for Raven and breathed, "finally."

Mr. Brunner stopped his story.

"Mr. Jackson," he said, "did you have a comment?"

My face was totally red. I said, "No, sir."

Mr. Brunner pointed to one of the pictures on the stele. "Perhaps you'll tell us what this picture represents?"

I looked at the carving, and felt a flush of relief, because I actually recognized it. "That's Kronos eating his kids, right?"

"Yes," Mr. Brunner said, obviously not satisfied. "And he did this because ..."

"Well..." I racked my brain to remember. "Kronos was the king god, and - "

"God?" Mr. Brunner asked.

"Titan," I corrected myself. "And ... he didn't trust his kids, who were the gods. So, um, Kronos ate them, right? But his wife hid baby Zeus, and gave Kronos a rock to eat instead. And later, when Zeus grew up, he tricked his dad, Kronos, into barfing up his brothers and sisters - "

"Eeew!" said one of the girls behind me.

"Oh, get a grip." Raven said annoyed.

" - and so there was this big fight between the gods and the Titans," I continued, "and the gods won."

Some snickers from the group.

"Nicely done Percy. You summed an entire war in 30 seconds." Raven said, "it would be nice if you included the bashing and smashing though."

Behind me, Nancy Bobofit mumbled to a friend, "Like we're going to use this in real life. Like it's going to say on our job applications, 'Please explain why Kronos ate his kids.'"

"I don't think that should be a problem with the job application Nancy. Considering you would actually have one." Raven retorted and then everyone laughed. Nancy turned red that I almost didn't see her Cheeto freckles.

Mr Bruner even snickered a bit but quickly ingnored it and focused his attention to me.

"And why, Mr. Jackson," Brunner said, "to paraphrase Miss Bobofit's excellent question, does this matter in real life?"

"Busted," Grover muttered.

"Shut up," Nancy hissed, her face even brighter red than her hair.

At least Nancy got packed, too. She even got humiliated by none other than . Brunner was the only one who ever caught her saying anything wrong. He had radar ears.

I thought about his question, and shrugged. "I don't know, sir."

"I see." Mr. Brunner looked disappointed. "Well, half credit, Mr. Jackson. Zeus did indeed feed Kronos a mixture of mustard and wine, which made him disgorge his other five children, who, of course, being immortal gods, had been living and growing up completely undigested in the Titan's stomach. The gods defeated their father, sliced him to pieces with his own scythe, and scattered his remains in Tartarus, the darkest part of the Underworld. On that happy note, it's time for lunch. Mrs. Dodds, would you lead us back outside?"

"How is that a happy note?" Raven whispered to me, "is it strawberry day or something?"

I just shrugged in response.

The class drifted off, the girls holding their stomachs, the guys pushing each other around and acting like doofuses.

Raven, Grover and I were about to follow when Mr. Brunner said, "Mr. Jackson."

I knew that was coming.

I told Grover and Raven to keep going. Then I turned toward Mr. Brunner. "Sir?"

Mr. Brunner had this look that wouldn't let you go - intense brown eyes that could've been a thousand years old and had seen everything.

"You must learn the answer to my question," Mr. Brunner told me.

"About the Titans?"

"About real life. And how your studies apply to it."

"Oh."

"What you learn from me," he said, "is vitally important. I expect you to treat it as such. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson."

I wanted to get angry, this guy pushed me so hard.

I mean, sure, it was kind of cool on tournament days, when he dressed up in a suit of Roman armor and shouted: "What ho!'" and challenged us, sword-point against chalk, to run to the board and name every Greek and Roman person who had ever lived, and their mother, and what god they worshipped. But Mr. Brunner expected me to be as good as everybody else, despite the fact that I have dyslexia and attention deficit disorder and I had never made above a C - in my life. No - he didn't expect me to be as good; he expected me to be better. And I just couldn't learn all those names and facts, much less spell them correctly.

I mumbled something about trying harder, while Mr. Brunner took one long sad look at the stele, like he'd been at this girl's funeral.

He told me to go outside and eat my lunch.

The class gathered on the front steps of the museum, where we could watch the foot traffic along Fifth Avenue.

Overhead, a huge storm was brewing, with clouds blacker than I'd ever seen over the city. I figured maybe it was global warming or something, because the weather all across New York state had been weird since Christmas. We'd had massive snow storms, flooding, wildfires from lightning strikes. I wouldn't have been surprised if this was a hurricane blowing in.

Nobody else seemed to notice. Raven did though. She was the most ADHD observant person I know. She looked at the sky like how she normally looks when she fidgets around with her gray rubix cube. I could hear her mutter something about 'they're fighting.'

I tried asking her about it but she'd just shrug and say,"Look it up." Then after she sprinted towards where Mr. Brunner was.

Some of the guys were pelting pigeons with Lunchables crackers. Nancy Bobofit was trying to pickpocket something from a lady's purse, and, of course, Mrs. Dodds wasn't seeing a thing.

Grover and I sat on the edge of the fountain, away from the others. We thought that maybe if we did that, everybody wouldn't know we were from that school - the school for loser freaks who couldn't make it elsewhere.

"Detention?" Grover asked.

"Nah," I said. "Not from Brunner. I just wish he'd lay off me sometimes. I mean - I'm not a genius."

Grover didn't say anything for a while. Then, when I thought he was going to give me some deep philosophical comment to make me feel better, he said, "Can I have your apple?"

I didn't have much of an appetite, so I let him take it.

I watched the stream of cabs going down Fifth Avenue, and thought about my mom's apartment, only a little ways uptown from where we sat. I hadn't seen her since Christmas. I wanted so bad to jump in a taxi and head home. She'd hug me and be glad to see me, but she'd be disappointed, too. She'd send me right back to Yancy, remind me that I had to try harder, even if this was my sixth school in six years and I was probably going to be kicked out again. I wouldn't be able to stand that sad look she'd give me.

Mr. Brunner parked his wheelchair at the base of the handicapped ramp. He ate celery while he read a paperback novel. A red umbrella stuck up from the back of his chair, making it look like a motorized cafe table.

He was obviously ignoring Raven from her attempts to figure out what were the sort questions the upcoming exams were going to be. She may not look like it but Raven is really smart. I'd ask her on how she does it but her answer would just be confusing. Something about probability, calculations and observations. She has dyslexia like me only hers is way worse. One time out English teacher decided it would be fun to torment her by reading a wordy poem from the textbook. Course she read poem like a 4 year old. Everyone laughed at her except me and Grover. Mr, Nicoll was so mean that he was even giving her some silent cackles.

In the end, Raven threw the textbook(it was a thick one at that.) at Mr. Nicoll's face cursing in some strange language that I managed to understand. "You know what you are?" She said angrily at Mr. Nicoll, "you're a two faced, prick-crothched pheasant!"

And then we all cheered. Raven received an in-school suspension.

Mr. Nicoll ended up with a black eye and huge bruise on his forehead and a salary cut from the principal because Raven told all the bad examples that he was giving to students with disorders; mainly, me, Raven and Grover.

But I'm pretty sure Raven blackmailed him.

And Mr. Nicoll never bothered Raven ever again. She was not someone who'd you want as an enemy.

I was about to unwrap my sandwich when Nancy Bobofit appeared in front of me with her ugly friends - I guess she'd gotten tired of stealing from the tourists - and dumped her half-eaten lunch in Grover's lap.

"Oops." She grinned at me with her crooked teeth. Her freckles were orange, as if somebody had spray-painted her face with liquid Cheetos.

I tried to stay cool. The school counselor had told me a million times, "Count to ten, get control of your temper." But I was so mad my mind went blank. A wave roared in my ears.

I don't remember touching her, but the next thing I knew, Nancy was sitting on her butt in the fountain, screaming, "Percy pushed me!"

Mrs. Dodds materialized next to us.

Some of the kids were whispering: "Did you see - "

" - the water - "

" - like it grabbed her - "

I didn't know what they were talking about. All I knew was that I was in trouble again.

As soon as Mrs. Dodds was sure poor little Nancy was okay, promising to get her a new shirt at the museum gift shop, etc., etc., Mrs. Dodds turned on me. There was a triumphant fire in her eyes, as if I'd done something she'd been waiting for all semester. "Now, honey - "

"I know," I grumbled. "A month erasing workbooks."

That wasn't the right thing to say.

"Come with me," Mrs. Dodds said.

"Wait!" Grover yelped. "It was me. I pushed her."

I stared at him, stunned. I couldn't believe he was trying to cover for me. Mrs. Dodds scared Grover to death.

She glared at him so hard his whiskery chin trembled.

"I don't think so, Mr. Underwood," she said.

"But - "

"You - will - stay - here."

Grover looked at me desperately.

"It's okay, man," I told him. "Thanks for trying."

"Honey," Mrs. Dodds barked at me. "Now."

Nancy Bobofit smirked.

I gave her my deluxe I'll-kill-you-later stare. Then I turned to face Mrs. Dodds, but she wasn't there. She was standing at the museum entrance, way at the top of the steps, gesturing impatiently at me to come on.

How'd she get there so fast?

I have moments like that a lot, when my brain falls asleep or something, and the next thing I know I've missed something, as if a puzzle piece fell out of the universe and left me staring at the blank place behind it. The school counselor told me this was part of the ADHD, my brain misinterpreting things.

I wasn't so sure.

I went after Mrs. Dodds.

Halfway up the steps, I glanced back at Grover. He was looking pale, cutting his eyes between me and Mr. Brunner, like he wanted Mr. Brunner to notice what was going on, but Mr. Brunner was absorbed in his novel.

I looked back up. Mrs. Dodds had disappeared again. She was now inside the building, at the end of the entrance hall.

Okay, I thought. She's going to make me buy a new shirt for Nancy at the gift shop.

But apparently that wasn't the plan.

I followed her deeper into the museum. When I finally caught up to her, we were back in the Greek and Roman section.

Except for us, the gallery was empty.

_'Under no circumstances are you allowed to be alone with her.' _I suddenly remembered Raven's words. But maybe she was just just joking. Trying to scare me off.

I should have listened to her.

Mrs. Dodds stood with her arms crossed in front of a big marble frieze of the Greek gods. She was making this weird noise in her throat, like growling.

Even without the noise, I would've been nervous. It's weird being alone with a teacher, especially Mrs. Dodds. Something about the way she looked at the frieze, as if she wanted to pulverize it...

"You've been giving us problems, honey," she said.

I did the safe thing. I said, "Yes, ma'am."

She tugged on the cuffs of her leather jacket. "Did you really think you would get away with it?"

The look in her eyes was beyond mad. It was evil.

She's a teacher, I thought nervously. It's not like she's going to hurt me.

I said, "I'll - I'll try harder, ma'am."

Thunder shook the building.

"We are not fools, Percy Jackson," Mrs. Dodds said. "It was only a matter of time before we found you out. Confess, and you will suffer less pain."

I didn't know what she was talking about.

All I could think of was that the teachers must've found the illegal stash of candy I'd been selling out of my dorm room. Or maybe they'd realized I got my essay on Tom Sawyer from the Internet without ever reading the book and now they were going to take away my grade. Or worse, they were going to make me read the book.

"Well?" she demanded.

"Ma'am, I don't..."

"Your time is up," she hissed.

Then the weirdest thing happened. Her eyes began to glow like barbecue coals. Her fingers stretched, turning into talons. Her jacket melted into large, leathery wings. She wasn't human. She was a shriveled hag with bat wings and claws and a mouth full of yellow fangs, and she was about to slice me to ribbons.

Then things got even stranger.

Mr. Brunner, who'd been out in front of the museum a minute before, wheeled his chair into the doorway of the gallery, holding a pen in his hand.

"What ho, Percy!" he shouted, and tossed the pen through the air.

Mrs. Dodds lunged at me.

With a yelp, I dodged and felt talons slash the air next to my ear. I snatched the ballpoint pen out of the air, but when it hit my hand, it wasn't a pen anymore. It was a sword - Mr. Brunner's bronze sword, which he always used on tournament day.

Mrs. Dodds spun toward me with a murderous look in her eyes.

My knees were jelly. My hands were shaking so bad I almost dropped the sword.

She snarled, "Die, honey!"

And she flew straight at me.

Absolute terror ran through my body. I did the only thing that came naturally: I swung the sword.

The metal blade hit her shoulder and passed clean through her body as if she were made of water. Hisss!

Mrs. Dodds was a sand castle in a power fan. She exploded into yellow powder, vaporized on the spot, leaving nothing but the smell of sulfur and a dying screech and a chill of evil in the air, as if those two glowing red eyes were still watching me.

I was alone.

There was a ballpoint pen in my hand.

Mr. Brunner wasn't there. Nobody was there but me.

My hands were still trembling. My lunch must've been contaminated with magic mushrooms or something.

Had I imagined the whole thing?

I went back outside.

It had started to rain.

Grover was sitting by the fountain, a museum map tented over his head. Nancy Bobofit was still standing there, soaked from her swim in the fountain, grumbling to her ugly friends. When she saw me, she said, "I hope Mrs. Kerr whipped your butt."

I said, "Who?"

"Our teacher. Duh!"

I blinked. We had no teacher named Mrs. Kerr. I asked Nancy what she was talking about.

She just rolled her eyes and turned away.

I asked Grover where Mrs. Dodds was.

He said, "Who?"

But he paused first, and he wouldn't look at me, so I thought he was messing with me.

"Not funny, man," I told him. "This is serious."

Thunder boomed overhead.

I saw Mr. Brunner sitting under his red umbrella, reading his book, as if he'd never moved.

I went over to him.

He looked up, a little distracted. "Ah, that would be my pen. Please bring your own writing utensil in the future, Mr. Jackson."

I handed Mr. Brunner his pen. I hadn't even realized I was still holding it.

"Sir," I said, "where's Mrs. Dodds?"

He stared at me blankly. "Who?"

"The other chaperone. Mrs. Dodds. The pre-algebra teacher."

He frowned and sat forward, looking mildly concerned. "Percy, there is no Mrs. Dodds on this trip. As far as I know, there has never been a Mrs. Dodds at YancyAcademy. Are you feeling all right?


	2. Chapter 2

I was used to the occasional weird experience, but usually they were over quickly. This twenty-four/seven hallucination was more than I could handle. For the rest of the school year, the entire campus seemed to be playing some kind of trick on me. The students acted as if they were completely and totally convinced that Mrs. Kerr - a perky blond woman whom I'd never seen in my life until she got on our bus at the end of the field trip - had been our pre-algebra teacher since Christmas.

Every so often I would spring a Mrs. Dodds reference on somebody, just to see if I could trip them up, but they would stare at me like I was psycho.

It got so I almost believed them - Mrs. Dodds had never existed.

Almost.

But Grover couldn't fool me. When I mentioned the name Dodds to him, he would hesitate, then claim she didn't exist. But I knew he was lying. Raven was also the other proof. She would stare at me like coldly and say, "you should have listened to me."

I tried to ask her if Mrs. Dodds existed and she'd just shook her head somberly and say, "Her name is not Mrs. Dodds, Percy. Look it up." And then walked away mysteriously.

Ugh, Raven and her stupid cryptic way of talking.

Something was going on. Something had happened at the museum.

I didn't have much time to think about it during the days, but at night, visions of Mrs. Dodds with talons and leathery wings would wake me up in a cold sweat.

The freak weather continued, which didn't help my mood. One night, a thunderstorm blew out the windows in my dorm room. A few days later, the biggest tornado ever spotted in the Hudson Valley touched down only fifty miles from Yancy Academy. One of the current events we studied in social studies class was the unusual number of small planes that had gone down in sudden squalls in the Atlantic that year.

I started feeling cranky and irritable most of the time. My grades slipped from Ds to Fs. I got into more fights with Nancy Bobofit and her friends. I was sent out into the hallway in almost every class.

Finally, when our English teacher, Mr. Nicoll, asked me for the millionth time why I was too lazy to study for spelling tests, I snapped. I called him an old sot. I wasn't even sure what it meant, but it sounded good.

The headmaster sent my mom a letter the following week, making it official: I would not be invited back next year to YancyAcademy.

Fine, I told myself. Just fine.

I was homesick.

I wanted to be with my mom in our little apartment on the Upper East Side, even if I had to go to public school and put up with my obnoxious stepfather and his stupid poker parties.

And yet... there were things I'd miss at Yancy. The view of the woods out my dorm window, the Hudson River in the distance, the smell of pine trees. I'd miss Grover, who'd been a good friend, even if he was a little strange. I worried how he'd survive next year without me. I'd also miss Raven. After the whole Mrs. Dodds incident she left school, Grover told me that she just transferred to another school but he's a really bad liar.

I wonder what happened to her.

Still, she gave me a card with a picture of a bronze sword on it after she left, "here, Percy. Keep this with you. If you are in a dangerous situation once again, just tap on this card once and it'll help you."

"Why?" I asked.

"Don't ask. Don't be a fish-for-brains. And use this only when you're in danger again."

I don't know what the card would do and I tried tapping on it but Raven scolded me and told me to wait. "You can only use this once."

I'd miss Latin class, too - Mr. Brunner's crazy tournament days and his faith that I could do well.

As exam week got closer, Latin was the only test I studied for. I hadn't forgotten what Mr. Brunner had told me about this subject being life-and-death for me. I wasn't sure why, but I'd started to believe him.

The evening before my final, I got so frustrated I threw the Cambridge Guide to Greek Mythology across my dorm room. Words had started swimming off the page, circling my head, the letters doing one-eighties as if they were riding skateboards. There was no way I was going to remember the difference between Chiron and Charon, or Polydictes and Polydeuces. And conjugating those Latin verbs? Forget it.

I paced the room, feeling like ants were crawling around inside my shirt.

I remembered Mr. Brunner's serious expression, his thousand-year-old eyes. I will accept only the best from you, Percy Jackson.

I took a deep breath. I picked up the mythology book.

I'd never asked a teacher for help before. Maybe if I talked to Mr. Brunner, he could give me some pointers. At least I could apologize for the big fat F I was about to score on his exam. I didn't want to leave Yancy Academy with him thinking I hadn't tried.

I walked downstairs to the faculty offices. Most of them were dark and empty, but Mr. Brunner's door was ajar, light from his window stretching across the hallway floor.

I was three steps from the door handle when I heard voices inside the office. Mr. Brunner asked a question. A voice that was definitely Grover's said "... worried about Percy, sir."

I froze.

I'm not usually an eavesdropper, but I dare you to try not listening if you hear your best friend talking about you to an adult.

I inched closer.

"... alone this summer," Grover was saying. "I mean, a Kindly One in the school! Now that we know for sure, and they know too - "

"We would only make matters worse by rushing him," Mr. Brunner said. "We need the boy to mature more."

"But he may not have time. The summer solstice deadline - "

"Will have to be resolved without him, Grover. Let him enjoy his ignorance while he still can."

"Sir, he saw her... ."

"His imagination," Mr. Brunner insisted. "The Mist over the students and staff will be enough to convince him of that."

"Sir, I ... I can't fail in my duties again." Grover's voice was choked with emotion. "You know what that would mean."

"You haven't failed, Grover," Mr. Brunner said kindly. "I should have seen her for what she was. Now let's just worry about keeping Percy alive until next fall - "

The mythology book dropped out of my hand and hit the floor with a thud.

Mr. Brunner went silent.

My heart hammering, I picked up the book and backed down the hall.

A shadow slid across the lighted glass of Brunner's office door, the shadow of something much taller than my wheelchair-bound teacher, holding something that looked suspiciously like an archer's bow.

I opened the nearest door and slipped inside.

A few seconds later I heard a slow clop-clop-clop, like muffled wood blocks, then a sound like an animal snuffling right outside my door. A large, dark shape paused in front of the glass, then moved on.

A bead of sweat trickled down my neck.

Somewhere in the hallway, Mr. Brunner spoke. "Nothing," he murmured. "My nerves haven't been right since the winter solstice."

"Mine neither," Grover said. "But I could have sworn ..."

"Go back to the dorm," Mr. Brunner told him. "You've got a long day of exams tomorrow."

"Don't remind me."

The lights went out in Mr. Brunner's office.

I waited in the dark for what seemed like forever.

"You're a bad eavesdropper." I heard a familiar voice. I was startled and actually fell,bumping into a chair. My heart was beating super fast and I was beginning to think if the rumors of a ghost were true.

The lights turned on.

"Raven?" I said. What was she doing here? She doesn't even go here anymore.

"Hello, Percy." Raven said. She was leaning on the wall, wearing an oversized sweatshirt with a CHB print on it. Her eyes looked cold and murderous at night. Like she was going to gut me with her little silver stick that she was twirling with her hand.

"What are you doing here?" I whispered-question to her.

"How much have you heard so far?"

"What...do you know what they were talking about?"

She nodded. But she won't tell me.

"Raven what is going on?" I was starting to get scared. Was Raven like Mrs. Dodds? I hope not.

"You're clueless." Now she's insulting me, "you really don't know anything do you?" She said.

"Know what?"

"About what was stolen? You're innocent. Too bad he won't believe me." She said cryptically.

"Raven what are you talking about? And how did you even get here?"

She gave me a weary smile, "you'll find out soon, Percy." She said as she stuffed the stick back unto the large pockets of her sweatshirt hoddie.

"Oh, and, I'm sorry."

"For what?" Is this about that time when she almost blew up the classroom during chemistry and blamed me for the damage?

She gave me a sad look, "you'll see."

"Take care of yourself, fish-for-brains."

The lights went off again. I turned it on and Raven was gone.

The door wasn't even open.

I've been having a confusing day. Finally, I slipped out into the hallway and made my way back up to the dorm.

A lot of things happened today;

Grover looked like he never even left the room, my favorite teacher made me cry, I saw 3 old ladies knitting socks and Grover was still a bad liar and he crept me out a lot so I ditched him on the bus and took a cab back home.

The good news was, My mom and I were going to Montauk this weekend.

…...

I woke with a start.

Outside, it really was storming; the kind of storm that cracks trees and blows down houses. There was no horse or eagle on the beach, just lightning making false daylight, and twenty-foot waves pounding the dunes like artillery.

With the next thunder-clap, my mom woke. She sat up, eyes wide, and said, "Hurricane."

I knew that was crazy. Long Island never sees hurricanes this early in the summer. But the ocean seemed to have forgotten. Over the roar of the wind, I heard a distant bellow, an angry, tortured sound that made my hair stand on end.

Then a much closer noise, like mallets in the sand. A desperate voices- someone yelling, pounding on our cabin door.

My mother sprang out of bed in her nightgown and threw open the lock.

Grover and Raven stood framed in the doorway against a backdrop of pouring rain. But Grover wasn't... he wasn't exactly Grover. And Raven...She looked terrible. Her clothes were torn, she had a couple of bruises on her legs, and there were even some scratches on her arms and a short gash on her left cheek. She also looked exhausted that her knees were trembling.

"Searching all night," he gasped. "What were you thinking?"

My mother looked at me in terror - not scared of Grover and Raven, but of why they'd come.

"Percy," she said, shouting to be heard over the rain. "What happened at school? What didn't you tell me?"

"Percy. Mrs. Jackson. We have to go. Now!" Raven demanded with a worried expression on her green eyes. She looked terrified, almost afraid for my sake. She looked at the sky like the lightning was going to zap her.

I was frozen, looking at Grover and Raven. I couldn't understand what I was seeing.

"O Zeu kai alloi theoi!" he yelled. "It's right behind me! Didn't you tell her?"

"You're such a sponge brain Percy!" Raven yelled at me angrily

I was too shocked to register that Grover just cursed in Ancient Greek, and I'd understood him perfectly. I was too shocked to listen to Raven's insult and to care that she's obviously hurt. I was too shocked to wonder how Grover and Raven had gotten all by themselves in the middle of the night. Because Grover didn't have his pants on - and where his legs should be ... where his legs should be...

My mom looked at me sternly and talked in a tone she'd never used before: "Percy. Tell me now!"

I stammered something about the old ladies at the fruit stand, and Mrs. Dodds, and my mom stared at me, her face deathly pale in the flashes of lightning.

"We have to go immediately." Raven said, her voice was hoarse from the exhaustion, "I can travel us there."

"Raven, No. You're too exhausted. Mist traveling will consume your remaining energy. You'd pass out." Grover warned her. Raven sneered at him but her face softened and she almost collapsed. Grover and I managed to catch her, "I'm fine. I can still stand." She said, still panting.

"We have to get you to camp." My mother said.

She grabbed her purse, tossed me my rain jacket, and said, "Get to the car. All of you. Go!" My mother and me helped Raven because she was already limping.

Grover ran for the Camaro - but he wasn't running, exactly. He was trotting, shaking his shaggy hindquarters, and suddenly his story about a muscular disorder in his legs made sense to me. I understood how he could run so fast and still limp when he walked.

Because where his feet should be, there were no feet. There were cloven hooves.

We tore through the night along dark country roads. Wind slammed against the Camaro. Rain lashed the windshield. I didn't know how my mom could see anything, but she kept her foot on the gas.

As for Raven, she suddenly felt better. Most of her wounds were healed and the bruises were gone after drinking something from her canteen.

"What happened to you?" I asked her.

She stared at me coldly, "killed a couple of Cyclops, shishkabbobed the Kindly Ones, 2 hell-hound. All of whom were after you."

I didn't get what she was saying. She mentioned the Kindly ones, but she used the plural term. That means there were more. A Cyclops? Weren't those one-eyed monsters. And what's a hell-hound? She killed a dog?!

I didn't know she was this ruthless.

"Don't I get a thank you?" She said.

I didn't know what to say. I wanted to scream that she was crazy but I was scared of getting poked in the eyes so I said, "thank you."

Every time there was a flash of lightning, Raven would cringe and curse something in Greek. I looked at Grover sitting next to me in the backseat and I wondered if I'd gone insane, or if he was wearing some kind of shag-carpet pants. But, no, the smell was one I remembered from kindergarten field trips to the petting zoo - lanolin, like from wool. The smell of a wet barnyard animal.

All I could think to say was, "So, you and my mom... know each other?"

Graver's eyes flitted to the rearview mirror, though there were no cars behind us. "Not exactly," he said. "I mean, we've never met in person. But she knew I was watching you."

"Watching me?"

"Keeping tabs on you. Making sure you were okay. But I wasn't faking being your friend," he added hastily. "I am your friend."

"Urn ... what are you, exactly?"

"That doesn't matter right now."

"It doesn't matter? From the waist down, my best friend is a donkey - "

Grover let out a sharp, throaty "Blaa-ha-ha!"

I'd heard him make that sound before, but I'd always assumed it was a nervous laugh. Now I realized it was more of an irritated bleat.

"Goat!" he cried.

"What?"

"He said he was a goat." Raven repeated, "Gosh, mini barnacle breath, you should pay attention to Greek mythology more."

"I'm a goat from the waist down." Said Grover.

"You just said it didn't matter."

"Blaa-ha-ha! There are satyrs who would trample you underhoof for such an insult!"

"Whoa. Wait. Satyrs. You mean like ... Mr. Brunner's myths?"

"Finally, he gets it!" Raven gave an exasperated sigh and huffed in annoyance.

"Were those old ladies at the fruit stand a myth, Percy? Was Mrs. Dodds a myth?" Grover said.

"So you admit there was a Mrs. Dodds!"

"Of course."

"Then why - "

"The less you knew, the fewer monsters you'd attract," Grover said, like that should be perfectly obvious. "We put Mist over the humans' eyes. We hoped you'd think the Kindly One was a hallucination. But it was no good. You started to realize who you are."

"Who I - wait a minute, what do you mean?"

"It was better if he knew. It's how they usually get killed." Raven said in a cool demeanor.

"Killed? What are you talking about?" I asked quickly.

The weird bellowing noise rose up again somewhere behind us, closer than before. Whatever was chasing us was still on our trail. Raven was fidgety. She kept on looking behind us and would occasionally jump from her seat.

Maybe it was the ADHD.

"Percy," my mom said, "there's too much to explain and not enough time. We have to get you to safety."

"Safety from what? Who's after me?"

"Oh, nobody much," Grover said, obviously still miffed about the donkey comment. "Just the Lord of the Dead and a few of his blood-thirstiest minions."

"Grover!"

"Sorry, Mrs. Jackson. Could you drive faster, please?"

I tried to wrap my mind around what was happening, but I couldn't do it. I knew this wasn't a dream. I had no imagination. I could never dream up something this weird.

"This isn't a dream, Percy." Raven said as if she was reading my mind, "everything is real. You have to prepare yourself. Recall all the things that Mr. Bruner taught you. If we're lucky well, you live." She said bleakly.

"If we're lucky?" I'm doomed then. I have the most rotten luck.

My mom made a hard left. We swerved onto a narrower road, racing past darkened farmhouses and wooded hills and PICK YOUR OWN STRAWBERRIES signs on white picket fences.

"Where are we going?" I asked.

"The summer camp I told you about." My mother's voice was tight; she was trying for my sake not to be scared. "The place your father wanted to send you."

"The place you didn't want me to go."

"Please, dear," my mother begged. "This is hard enough. Try to understand. You're in danger."

"Because some old ladies cut yarn."

"Those weren't old ladies," Grover said. "Those were the Fates. Do you know what it means - the fact they appeared in front of you? They only do that when you're about to ... when someone's about to die."

"Whoa. You said 'you.'"

"No I didn't. I said 'someone.'"

"You meant 'you.' As in me."

"I meant you, like 'someone.' Not you, you."

"Boys!" Both my mom and Raven said.

"Stop being doffuses. Were at the brink of our deaths here." Raven said, as she fidgeted around with her card. It was the same card that she gave me only this time there was a picture of a diamond sword on it. The picture looked real. Like...3D and I felt like I could just grab it and take it out of its card and BAM! I now have a tiny sword in my hands.

My mom pulled the wheel hard to the right, and I got a glimpse of a figure she'd swerved to avoid - a dark fluttering shape now lost behind us in the storm.

"What was that?" I asked.

"Oh no. Oh no. Oh no." Raven stammered, "he's sending the bull. I can't believe he's sending the bull."

"We're almost there," my mother said, ignoring my question. And Raven's stammer."Another mile. Please. Please. Please."

I didn't know where there was, but I found myself leaning forward in the car, anticipating, wanting us to arrive.

Outside, nothing but rain and darkness - the kind of empty countryside you get way out on the tip of Long Island. I thought about Mrs. Dodds and the moment when she'd changed into the thing with pointed teeth and leathery wings. My limbs went numb from delayed shock. She really hadn't been human. She'd meant to kill me.

Then I thought about Mr. Brunner ... and the sword he had thrown me. Before I could ask Grover about that, the hair rose on the back of my neck. There was a blinding flash, a jaw-rattling boom!, and our car exploded.

I remember feeling weightless, like I was being crushed, fried, and hosed down all at the same time.

I peeled my forehead off the back of the driver's seat and said, "Ow."

"Percy!" my mom shouted.

"I'm okay... ."

I heard Raven groan, "Ugh… I freaking hate thunder gods." She said angrily.

Gods?

I tried to shake off the daze. I wasn't dead. The car hadn't really exploded. We'd swerved into a ditch. Our driver's-side doors were wedged in the mud. The roof had cracked open like an eggshell and rain was pouring in.

Lightning. That was the only explanation. We'd been blasted right off the road. Next to me in the backseat was a big motionless lump. "Grover!"

He was slumped over, blood trickling from the side of his mouth. I shook his furry hip, thinking, No! Even if you are half barnyard animal, you're my best friend and I don't want you to die!

Then he groaned "Food," and I knew there was hope.

"Percy," my mother said, "we have to ..." Her voice faltered.

I looked back. In a flash of lightning, through the mud-spattered rear windshield, I saw a figure lumbering toward us on the shoulder of the road. The sight of it made my skin crawl. It was a dark silhouette of a huge guy, like a football player. He seemed to be holding a blanket over his head. His top half was bulky and fuzzy. His upraised hands made it look like he had horns.

I swallowed hard. "Who is - "

"Percy," my mother said, deadly serious. "Get out of the car."

"We have to get out of her now, Percy. I'll stall the bull. Get back to safety."

"Raven. Wait!" I protested but she somehow got out of the car and sprinted towards the figure. Another strange thing happened.

Raven was holding a baseball bat. No wait...a frying pan? A wooded branch?

The image kept on changing that it made my head hurt even more.

My mother threw herself against the driver's-side door. It was jammed shut in the mud. I tried mine. Stuck too. I looked up desperately at the hole in the roof. It might've been an exit, but the edges were sizzling and smoking.

"Climb out the passenger's side!" my mother told me. "Percy - you have to run. Do you see that big tree?"

"What?"

Another flash of lightning, and through the smoking hole in the roof I saw the tree she meant: a huge, White House Christmas tree-sized pine at the crest of the nearest hill.

"That's the property line," my mom said. "Get over that hill and you'll see a big farmhouse down in the valley. Run and don't look back. Yell for help. Don't stop until you reach the door."

The lightning flashed again and I saw Raven's silhouette battling with the giant figure. She was having a hard time and was losing from the looks of it. I was scared if she was going to die but then I focused my attention to my mother,

"Mom, you're coming too."

Her face was pale, her eyes as sad as when she looked at the ocean.

"No!" I shouted. "You are coming with me. Help me carry Grover."

"Food!" Grover moaned, a little louder.

The man with the blanket on his head kept coming toward us, making his grunting, snorting noises. I couldn't see Raven anymore.

Was she dead?

As he got closer, I realized he couldn't be holding a blanket over his head, because his hands - huge meaty hands - were swinging at his sides. There was no blanket. Meaning the bulky, fuzzy mass that was too big to be his head ... was his head. And the points that looked like horns...

"He doesn't want us," my mother told me. "He wants you. Besides, I can't cross the property line."

"But..."

"We don't have time, Percy. Go. Please."

I got mad, then - mad at my mother, at Grover the goat, at the thing with horns that was lumbering toward us slowly and deliberately like, like a bull.

I climbed across Grover and pushed the door open into the rain. "We're going together. Come on, Mom."

"I told you - "

"Mom! I am not leaving you. Help me with Grover."

I didn't wait for her answer. I scrambled outside, dragging Grover from the car. He was surprisingly light, but I couldn't have carried him very far if my mom hadn't come to my aid.

Together, we draped Grover's arms over our shoulders and started stumbling uphill through wet waist-high grass.

Glancing back, I got my first clear look at the monster. He was seven feet tall, easy, his arms and legs like something from the cover of Muscle Man magazine - bulging biceps and triceps and a bunch of other 'ceps, all stuffed like baseballs under vein-webbed skin. He wore no clothes except underwear - I mean, bright white Fruit of the Looms - which would've looked funny, except that the top half of his body was so scary. Coarse brown hair started at about his belly button and got thicker as it reached his shoulders.

His neck was a mass of muscle and fur leading up to his enormous head, which had a snout as long as my arm, snotty nostrils with a gleaming brass ring, cruel black eyes, and horns - enormous black-and-white horns with points you just couldn't get from an electric sharpener.

I recognized the monster, all right. He had been in one of the first stories Mr. Brunner told us. But he couldn't be real.

I blinked the rain out of my eyes. "That's - "

"Pasiphae's son," my mother said. "I wish I'd known how badly they want to kill you."

"But he's the Min - "

"Don't say his name," she warned. "Names have power."

The pine tree was still way too far - a hundred yards uphill at least.

I glanced behind me again.

The bull-man hunched over our car, looking in the windows - or not looking, exactly. More like snuffling, nuzzling. I wasn't sure why he bothered, since we were only about fifty feet away. Thankfully, I saw Raven. She wasn't dead after all. She tried her best in stalling the Minotaur but the monster seemed to ignore her.

"Food?" Grover moaned.

"Shhh," I told him. "Mom, what's he doing? Doesn't he see us?"

"His sight and hearing are terrible," she said. "He goes by smell. But he'll figure out where we are soon enough."

"Raven's getting tired. She might—" too late. The Minotaur grabbed her and threw her straight at us. Me and Mom managed to catch her. She was in a terrible shape than she was before. She was barely conscious. She scrambled and picked up a tree branch from the ground. Only it wasn't a tree branch. It was a 3 foot long diamond sword with a green hilt.

It was beautiful but deadly. There was some blood on it even.

"That guy is tough. He just won't disintegrate." I could hear her mutter. Her voice hoarse from exhaustion and I think she broke her ankle.

As if on cue, the bull-man bellowed in rage. He picked up Gabe's Camaro by the torn roof, the chassis creaking and groaning. He raised the car over his head and threw it down the road. It slammed into the wet asphalt and skidded in a shower of sparks for about half a mile before coming to a stop. The gas tank exploded.

Not a scratch, I remembered Gabe saying.

Oops.

"Percy," Raven panted, "When he sees us, he'll charge. Wait until the last second, then jump out of the way - directly sideways. He can't change directions very well once he's charging. Do you understand?"

"How do you know all this?" I told her.

Even though she was covered in mud, blood and her hair was even messier than before, her eyes showed confidence. This certainly wasn't her first time doing this. She gave me her trademark smirk and said, ,"I was planning something like this for a long time. I knew H was going to end someone after you. I don't expect the Minotaur. But I already had a contingency plan on case he ever shows up."

Who was H?

"Frankly I expected that it would be the furies again, but don't worry. I'm sure you can kill this bull. Your namesake did it before I'm sure you can do it again."

"My namesake? You mean the original Perseus from the myths. But I can't do that! I'm not him. We only shared a name." I yelled-whispered at her.

"It was Theseus, dear." My mother deadpanned.

"Oh…" She said sheepishly. See, I'm not the only one who doesn't pay attention to Greek class.

"But hey, you both shared something in common.—" she didn't get to finish.

"I should have expected this. I was selfish, keeping you near me." My mother said in a tone of regret.

"Keeping me near you? But - "

Another bellow of rage, and the bull-man started tromping uphill.

He'd smelled us.

The pine tree was only a few more yards, but the hill was getting steeper and slicker, and Grover wasn't getting any lighter.

"Do you still have that card I gave you?" Raven said looking at the Minotaur as he was closing in on us. She gripped her sword tightly. Although I'm not sure how she was going to fight because my mother was helping her up.

"Yeah..."I've always kept her card in my pockets just in case if another Mrs. Dodds incident was going to happen. I took it out of my pocket, "good. Cuz you'll need it."

I didn't know what she was talking about. What was the card going to do? If I tap on it will the sword magically come out?

Apparently it did.

The card dissolved and I was holding a bronze sword. I was too scared to care. The bull-man closed in. Another few seconds and he'd be on top of us.

My mother must've been exhausted, but she shouldered Grover and Raven who was standing on one leg.

Wow. My mom was strong

. "Go, Percy! Separate! Remember what I said." Raven wanted to come with me and fight but from her condition right now made it hard for her to protect herself let alone stand upright. I told her that she'd have to stay.

I didn't want to split up, but I had the feeling she was right - it was our only chance. I sprinted to the left, turned, and saw the creature bearing down on me. His black eyes glowed with hate. He reeked like rotten meat.

He lowered his head and charged, those razor-sharp horns aimed straight at my chest.

I gripped the hilt of the sword tightly.

The fear in my stomach made me want to bolt, but that wouldn't work. I could never outrun this thing. So I held my ground, and at the last moment, I jumped to the side.

The bull-man stormed past like a freight train, then bellowed with frustration and turned, but not toward me this time, toward my mother, who was setting Grover down in the grass.

We'd reached the crest of the hill. Down the other side I could see a valley, just as my mother had said, and the lights of a farmhouse glowing yellow through the rain. But that was half a mile away. We'd never make it.

The bull-man grunted, pawing the ground. He kept eyeing my mother, who was now retreating slowly downhill, back toward the road, trying to lead the monster away from Grover and Raven.

"Run, Percy!" she told me. "I can't go any farther. Run!"

But I just stood there, frozen in fear, as the monster charged her. She tried to sidestep, as she'd told me to do, but the monster had learned his lesson. His hand shot out and grabbed her by the neck as she tried to get away. Raven sliced the monster's arm with the remaining strength she had left. The Minotaur gave out a loud roar of pain. The hand disintegrated into dust and my mom was released from his grasp.

But it wasn't over yet. The Minotaur still had another arm so he used it to throw Raven with simply the flick of his other arm.

"Raven!" I shouted. She hit a tree and stayed unconscious.

I hope she wasn't dead. Oh please don't let her be dead.

The Minotaur lifted my Mom with her other arm. She struggled, kicking and pummeling the air.

"Mom!"

She caught my eyes, managed to choke out one last word: "Go!"

Then, with an angry roar, the monster closed his fists around my mother's neck, and she dissolved before my eyes, melting into light, a shimmering golden form, as if she were a holographic projection. A blinding flash and she was simply ... gone.

"No!"

Anger replaced my fear. Newfound strength burned in my limbs - the same rush of energy I'd gotten when Mrs. Dodds grew talons.

The bull-man bore down on Grover, who lay helpless in the grass. The monster hunched over, snuffling my best friend, as if he were about to lift Grover up and make him dissolve too.

I couldn't allow that.

I stripped off my red rain jacket.

"Hey!" I screamed, waving the jacket, running to one side of the monster. "Hey, stupid! Ground beef!"

"Raaaarrrrr!" The monster turned toward me, shaking his meaty fists.

I had an idea - a stupid idea, but better than no idea at all. I put my back to the big pine tree and waved my red jacket in front of the bull-man, thinking I'd jump out of the way at the last moment.

But it didn't happen like that.

The bull-man charged too fast, his arms out to grab me whichever way I tried to dodge.

Time slowed down.

My legs tensed. I couldn't jump sideways, so I leaped straight up, kicking off from the creature's head, using it as a springboard, turning in midair, and landing on his neck.

How did I do that? I didn't have time to figure it out. A millisecond later, the monster's head slammed into the tree and the impact nearly knocked my teeth out.

The bull-man staggered around, trying to shake me. My only source of weapon slipped away from my hands and dropped.

Great. Just Great.

But I didn't care anymore. I locked my arms around his horns to keep from being thrown. Thunder and lightning were still going strong. The rain was in my eyes. The smell of rotten meat burned my nostrils.

The monster shook himself around and bucked like a rodeo bull. He should have just backed up into the tree and smashed me flat, but I was starting to realize that this thing had only one gear: forward.

Meanwhile, Grover started groaning in the grass. I wanted to yell at him to shut up, but the way I was getting tossed around, if I opened my mouth I'd bite my own tongue off.

"Food!" Grover moaned.

The bull-man wheeled toward him, pawed the ground again, and got ready to charge. I thought about how he had squeezed the life out of my mother, made her disappear in a flash of light, and rage filled me like high-octane fuel. I got one hands around one horn and I pulled backward with all my might. The monster tensed, gave a surprised grunt, then - snap!

The bull-man screamed and flung me through the air. I landed flat on my back in the grass. My head smacked against a rock. When I sat up, my vision was blurry, but I had a horn in my hands, a ragged bone weapon the size of a knife. Oh, and the sword was luckily just beside me. I grabbed it again hoping that it wont slip off my hands again.

The monster charged.

Without thinking, I rolled to one side and came up kneeling. As the monster barreled past, I drove the broken horn and the sword straight into his side, right up under his furry rib cage.

The bull-man roared in agony. He flailed, clawing at his chest, then began to disintegrate - not like my mother, in a flash of golden light, but like crumbling sand, blown away in chunks by the wind, the same way Mrs. Dodds had burst apart.

The monster was gone.

The rain had stopped. The storm still rumbled, but only in the distance. I smelled like livestock and my knees were shaking. My head felt like it was splitting open. I was weak and scared and trembling with grief I'd just seen my mother vanish. I wanted to lie down and cry, but there was Grover and Raven, needing my help.

I went to where Raven was lying. Checking her pulse, she was still alive. Albeit, she was breathing slowly. I sighed in relief. So I managed to haul them up and stagger down into the valley, toward the lights of the farmhouse. I was crying, calling for my mother, but I held on to Grover and Raven - I wasn't going to let them go.

The last thing I remember is collapsing on a wooden porch, looking up at a ceiling fan circling above me, moths flying around a yellow light, and the stern faces of a familiar-looking bearded man and a pretty girl, her blond hair curled like a princess's. They both looked down at me, and the girl said, "He's the one. He must be."

"Silence, Annabeth," the man said. "He's still conscious. Bring him inside."


	3. Chapter 3

I had weird dreams full of barnyard animals. Most of them wanted to kill me. The rest wanted food.

I must've woken up several times, but what I heard and saw made no sense, so I just passed out again. I remember lying in a soft bed, being spoon-fed something that tasted like buttered popcorn, only it was pudding. The girl with curly blond hair hovered over me, smirking as she scraped drips off my chin with the spoon.

When she saw my eyes open, she asked, "What will happen at the summer solstice?"

I managed to croak, "What?"

She looked around, as if afraid someone would overhear. "What's going on? What was stolen? We've only got a few weeks!"

"I'm sorry," I mumbled, "I don't..."

Somebody knocked on the door, and the girl quickly filled my mouth with pudding.

The next time I woke up, the girl was gone.

A husky blond dude, like a surfer, stood in the corner of the bedroom keeping watch over me. He had blue eyes - at least a dozen of them - on his cheeks, his forehead, the backs of his hands.

When I finally came around for good, there was nothing weird about my surroundings, except that they were nicer than I was used to. I was sitting in a deck chair on a huge porch, gazing across a meadow at green hills in the distance. The breeze smelled like strawberries. There was a blanket over my legs, a pillow behind my neck. All that was great, but my mouth felt like a scorpion had been using it for a nest. My tongue was dry and nasty and every one of my teeth hurt.

On the table next to me was a tall drink. It looked like iced apple juice, with a green straw and a paper parasol stuck through a maraschino cherry.

My hand was so weak I almost dropped the glass once I got my fingers around it.

"Careful," a familiar voice said.

Grover was leaning against the porch railing, looking like he hadn't slept in a week. Under one arm, he cradled a shoe box. He was wearing blue jeans, Converse hi-tops and a bright orange T-shirt that said CAMPHALF-BLOOD.

Just plain old Grover, Not the goat boy.

I sighed in relief knowing he was okay. Then I thought about Raven. In just hoped she wasn't dead yet. So maybe I'd had a nightmare. Maybe my mom was okay. We were still on vacation, and we'd stopped here at this big house for some reason. And...

Well, apparently, everything that happened was real. I have been out for two days, Grover was a satyr, my mom was gone, and I know had a Minotaur horn as a souvenir and well…I learned that names had power.

Grover was blaming himself for everything that had happened,

"I'm sorry," Grover sniffled. "I'm a failure. I'm - I'm the worst satyr in the world."

He moaned, stomping his foot so hard it came off. I mean, the Converse hi-top came off. The inside was filled with Styrofoam, except for a hoof-shaped hole.

"Oh, Styx!" he mumbled.

Thunder rolled across the clear sky.

As he struggled to get his hoof back in the fake foot, I thought, Well, that settles it.

"It wasn't your fault, Grover." I said reassuringly.

I stared across the meadow. There were groves of trees, a winding stream, acres of strawberries spread out under the blue sky. The valley was surrounded by rolling hills, and the tallest one, directly in front of us, was the one with the huge pine tree on top. Even that looked beautiful in the sunlight. My mother was gone. The whole world should be black and cold. Nothing should look beautiful.  
I was alone. An orphan. I would have to live with ... Smelly Gabe? No. That would never happen. I would live on the streets first. I would pretend I was seventeen and join the army. I'd do something.

Grover was still sniffling. The poor kid - poor goat, satyr, whatever - looked as if he expected to be hit.

"Yes, it was. I was supposed to protect you."

"Did my mother ask you to protect me?"

"No. But that's my job. I'm a keeper. At least...

"what about Raven? Was she there to protect me too?" I asked.

Grover smiled grimly, "I don't know, Percy. She wouldn't tell me and Chiron. But I had the feeling she wasn't there in the first place to protect you." He said as if Raven was suppose to kill me first.

"But why ..." I suddenly felt dizzy, my vision swimming.

"Don't strain yourself," Grover said. "Here." He helped me hold my glass and put the straw to my lips.

I recoiled at the taste, because I was expecting apple juice. It wasn't that at all. It was chocolate-chip cookies. Liquid cookies. And not just any cookies - my mom's homemade blue chocolate-chip cookies, buttery and hot, with the chips still melting. Drinking it, my whole body felt warm and good, full of energy. My grief didn't go away, but I felt as if my mom had just brushed her hand against my cheek, given me a cookie the way she used to when I was small, and told me everything was going to be okay.

Before I knew it, I'd drained the glass. I stared into it, sure I'd just had a warm drink, but the ice cubes hadn't even melted.

"Was it good?" Grover asked.

I nodded.

"What did it taste like?" He sounded so wistful, I felt guilty.

"Sorry," I said. "I should've let you taste."

His eyes got wide. "No! That's not what I meant. I just... wondered."

"Chocolate-chip cookies," I said. "My mom's. Homemade."

He sighed. "And how do you feel?"

"Like I could throw Nancy Bobofit a hundred yards."

"That's good," he said. "That's good. I don't think you could risk drinking any more of that stuff."

"What do you mean?"

He took the empty glass from me gingerly, as if it were dynamite, and set it back on the table. "Come on. Chiron and Mr. D are waiting."

The porch wrapped all the way around the farmhouse.

My legs felt wobbly, trying to walk that far. Grover offered to carry the Minotaur horn, but I held on to it. I'd paid for that souvenir the hard way. I wasn't going to let it go.

As we walked, I asked him about Raven and how was she doing right now.

"Raven's fine now. She heals faster than most campers. I think she's at the strawberry fields right now."

I smiled knowing that my friend was fine. Although I'm probably going to ask her a lot about what happened after this. There was just some part of me that felt like I had to be angry at her. For all I know Raven was just pretending to be my friend. I don't even remember her at the first day of school. I think she came a month before we went to the museum.

Grover said that Raven's purpose wasn't to bring me to camp. I shook my head to get rid of the thought that her reason was that she was suppose to kill me. Raven's not that ruthless.

I think?

As we came around the opposite end of the house, I caught my breath.

Down at the end of the porch, two men sat across from each other at a card table. The blond-haired girl who'd spoon-fed me popcorn-flavored pudding was leaning on the porch rail next to them.

The man facing me was small, but porky. He had a red nose, big watery eyes, and curly hair so black it was almost purple. He looked like those paintings of baby angels - what do you call them, hubbubs? No, cherubs. That's it. He looked like a cherub who'd turned middle-aged in a trailer park. He wore a tiger-pattern Hawaiian shirt, and he would've fit right in at one of Gabe's poker parties, except I got the feeling this guy could've out-gambled even my stepfather.

"That's Mr. D," Grover murmured to me. "He's the camp director. Be polite. The girl, that's Annabeth Chase. She's just a camper, but she's been here longer than just about anybody."

He pointed at the guy whose back was to me.

First, I realized he was sitting in the wheelchair. Then I recognized the tweed jacket, the thinning brown hair, the scraggly beard.

"Mr. Brunner!" I cried.

The Latin teacher turned and smiled at me. His eyes had that mischievous glint they sometimes got in class when he pulled a pop quiz and made all the multiple choice answers B.

"Ah, good, Percy," he said. "Now we have four for pinochle."

He offered me a chair to the right of Mr. D, who looked at me with bloodshot eyes and heaved a great sigh. "Oh, I suppose I must say it. Welcome to Camp Half-Blood. There. Now, don't expect me to be glad to see you."

"Uh, thanks." I scooted a little farther away from him because, if there was one thing I had learned from living with Gabe, it was how to tell when an adult has been hitting the happy juice. If Mr. D was a stranger to alcohol, I was a satyr.

"Annabeth?" Mr. Brunner called to the blond girl.

She came forward and Mr. Brunner introduced us. "This young lady nursed you back to health, Percy. Annabeth, my dear, why don't you go check on Percy's bunk? We'll be putting him in cabin eleven for now."

Annabeth said, "Sure, Chiron."

She was probably my age, maybe a couple of inches taller, and a whole lot more athletic looking. With her deep tan and her curly blond hair, she was almost exactly what I thought a stereotypical California girl would look like, except her eyes ruined the image. They were startling gray, like storm clouds; pretty, but intimidating, too, as if she were analyzing the best way to take me down in a fight.

She glanced at the Minotaur horn in my hands, then back at me. I imagined she was going to say, you killed a Minotaur! Or Wow, you're so awesome! Or something like that.

Instead she said, "You drool when you sleep."

Then she sprinted off down the lawn, her blond hair flying behind her. I could

"So," I said, anxious to change the subject. "You, uh, work here, Mr. Brunner?"

I just had a hard time believing everything that Mr. Brunner or Chiron; apparently he's a Centaur whose legs had been concealed in his wheelchair. And that the Greek myths were real. Zeus, Apollo, Hera ect… were all real. _'The gods move to the heart of the west' _was what Mr. Brun—I mean, Chiron said. The gods were real and they live here in America.

I'm even talking to one.

Mr. D was actually the Greek god of wine, Dionysus. I guess he's still grumpy because his daddy grounded him.

Once I got over the fact that my Latin teacher was a horse, we had a nice tour, though I was careful not to walk behind him. I'd done pooper-scooper patrol in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade a few times, and, I'm sorry, I did not trust Chiron's back end the way I trusted his front.

We passed the volleyball pit. Several of the campers nudged each other. One pointed to the Minotaur horn I was carrying. Another said, "That's him."

Most of the campers were older than me. Their satyr friends were bigger than Grover, all of them trotting around in orange CAMPHALF-BLOOD T-shirts, with nothing else to cover their bare shaggy hindquarters. I wasn't normally shy, but the way they stared at me made me uncomfortable. I felt like they were expecting me to do a flip or something.

I looked back at the farmhouse. It was a lot bigger than I'd realized - four stories tall, sky blue with white trim, like an upscale seaside resort. I was checking out the brass eagle weather vane on top when something caught my eye, a shadow in the uppermost window of the attic gable. Something had moved the curtain, just for a second, and I got the distinct impression I was being watched.

"What's up there?" I asked Chiron.

He looked where I was pointing, and his smile faded. "Just the attic."

"Somebody lives there?"

"No," he said with finality. "Not a single living thing."

I got the feeling he was being truthful. But I was also sure something had moved that curtain.

"Come along, Percy," Chiron said, his lighthearted tone now a little forced. "Lots to see."

We walked through the strawberry fields, where campers were picking bushels of berries while a satyr played a tune on a reed pipe.

Chiron told me the camp grew a nice crop for export to New York restaurants and MountOlympus. "It pays our expenses," he explained. "And the strawberries take almost no effort."

He said Mr. D had this effect on fruit-bearing plants: they just went crazy when he was around. It worked best with wine grapes, but Mr. D was restricted from growing those, so they grew strawberries instead.

I've learn a lot from my little tour at camp, There were 12 cabins all lined up in a U formation. Each one was different. But I say my favorite was cabin 3. The cabin reminded me of me and my Mom's cabin at Montauk. Only this one felt lonely. Like nobody has lived there for a long time. Chiron was the actual Chiron from the myths; the trainer of Hercules and a bunch of other heroes.

The blond girl I'd met at the Big House was reading a book in front of the last cabin on the left, number eleven.

When we reached her, she looked me over critically, like she was still thinking about how much I drooled.

I tried to see what she was reading, but I couldn't make out the title. I thought my dyslexia was acting up. Then I realized the title wasn't even English. The letters looked Greek to me. I mean, literally Greek. There were pictures of temples and statues and different kinds of columns, like those in an architecture book.

"Annabeth," Chiron said, "I have masters' archery class at noon. Would you take Percy from here?"

"Yes, sir."

"Cabin eleven," Chiron told me, gesturing toward the doorway. "Make yourself at home."

Out of all the cabins, eleven looked the most like a regular old summer camp cabin, with the emphasis on old. The threshold was worn down, the brown paint peeling. Over the doorway was one of those doctor's symbols, a winged pole with two snakes wrapped around it. What did they call it... ? A caduceus.

Inside, it was packed with people, both boys and girls, way more than the number of bunk beds. Sleeping bags were spread all over on the floor. It looked like a gym where the Red Cross had set up an evacuation center.

Chiron didn't go in. The door was too low for him. But when the campers saw him they all stood and bowed respectfully.

"Well, then," Chiron said. "Good luck, Percy. I'll see you at dinner."

He galloped away toward the archery range.

I stood in the doorway, looking at the kids. They weren't bowing anymore. They were staring at me, sizing me up. I knew this routine. I'd gone through it at enough schools.

"Well?" Annabeth prompted. "Go on."

So naturally I tripped coming in the door and made a total fool of myself. There were some snickers from the campers, but none of them said anything.

Annabeth announced, "Percy Jackson, meet cabin eleven.

"Regular or undetermined?" A boy who looked 16 with platinum almost white hair who kinda looked liked Raven except he had white misty eyes, asked me.

I didn't know what to say, but Annabeth said, "Undetermined."

Everybody groaned.

A guy who was a little older than the rest came forward. "Now, now, campers. That's what we're here for. Welcome, Percy. You can have that spot on the floor, right over there."

The guy was about nineteen, and he looked pretty cool. He was tall and muscular, with short-cropped sandy hair and a friendly smile. He wore an orange tank top, cutoffs, sandals, and a leather necklace with five different-colored clay beads. The only thing unsettling about his appearance was a thick white scar that ran from just beneath his right eye to his jaw, like an old knife slash.

"This is Luke," Annabeth said, and her voice sounded different somehow. I glanced over and could've sworn she was blushing. She saw me looking, and her expression hardened again. "He's your counselor for now."

"For now?" I asked.

"You're undetermined," Luke explained patiently. "They don't know what cabin to put you in, so you're here. Cabin eleven takes all newcomers, all visitors. Naturally, we would. Hermes, our patron, is the god of travelers."

I looked at the tiny section of floor they'd given me. I had nothing to put there to mark it as my own, no luggage, no clothes, and no sleeping bag. Just the Minotaur's horn. I thought about setting that down, but then I remembered that Hermes was also the god of thieves.

I looked around at the campers' faces, some sullen and suspicious, some grinning stupidly, some eyeing me as if they were waiting for a chance to pick my pockets.

The platinum blonde was observing me. He had an all-knowing-smirk on his face like he just figured something out. I just had a feeling in my gut that this guy was not someone who you should trust.

Annabeth held my wrist and said that I had to see the volleyball pits,

"But I already seen it" She didn't listen, only she tighten her grip on my wrist and dragged me out og the cabin. I could hear the cabin 11 campers' snickers and laughs.

She and I got into an argument (or at least I thought it was an argument.) about monsters not dying and that kids were wanting the chance to get killed by monsters. (Annabeth said it was what they trained for) and that I'm actually a half-blood.

Then a husky voice yelled, "Well! A newbie!"

I looked over. The big girl from the ugly red cabin was sauntering toward us. She had three other girls behind her, all big and ugly and mean looking like her, all wearing camo jackets.

"Clarisse," Annabeth sighed. "Why don't you go polish your spear or something?"

"Sure, Miss Princess," the big girl said. "So I can run you through with it Friday night."

''Erre es korakas!" Annabeth said, which I somehow understood was Greek for 'Go to the crows!' though I had a feeling it was a worse curse than it sounded. "You don't stand a chance."

"We'll pulverize you," Clarisse said, but her eye twitched. Perhaps she wasn't sure she could follow through on the threat. She turned toward me.

Annabeth smiled, smugly, "you do know that Raven is with us this time." Clarisse scowled at the mention of this, "so what...I'm not afraid of the Albino and her brother. And plus, she's probably still weak from her failed attempt to kill the Minotour." She said.

"So you're admitting that Raven is strong."

The girl looked perplexed, "You used weak as a past-tense." Annabeth said. The girl scowled and Change the topic, "Who's this little runt?"

"Percy Jackson," Annabeth said, "meet Clarisse, Daughter of Ares."

I blinked. "Like ... the war god?"

Clarisse sneered. "You got a problem with that?"

"No," I said, recovering my wits. "It explains the bad smell."

Clarisse growled. "We got an initiation ceremony for newbies, Prissy."

"Percy."

"Whatever. Come on, I'll show you."

"Clarisse - " Annabeth tried to say.

"Stay out of it, wise girl."

Annabeth looked pained, but she did stay out of it, and I didn't really want her help. I was the new kid. I had to earn my own rep.

I handed Annabeth my Minotaur horn and got ready to fight, but before I knew it, Clarisse had me by the neck and was dragging me toward a cinder-block building that I knew immediately was the bathroom. While she was doing that, I could see Raven approached Annabeth with a basket full of strawberries in her hands. She looked fine although I admit that she still looked tired. She was smiling at her and when she looked at me. I was hoping that well that she would help. But instead she continued to stuff her mouth with way too many strawberries that she almost choked.

"Aren't you going help?" I could still hear Annabeth as she questioned Raven. "I mean he did help you when you were unconscious." Annabeth rolled her eyes in the process as Raven gorged herself with the basket of ripe and full strawberries. I'm more of a fan of blueberries but those looked very delicious.

"Nah...I wanna clarify something." Raven spoke with her mouth full muffling up the words.

I didn't even get a thank you from her.

I was kicking and punching. I'd been in plenty of fights before, but this big girl Clarisse had hands like iron. She dragged me into the girls' bathroom. There was a line of toilets on one side and a line of shower stalls down the other. It smelled just like any public bathroom, and I was thinking - as much as I could think with Clarisse ripping my hair out - that if this place belonged to the gods, they should've been able to afford classier johns.

Clarisse's friends were all laughing, and I was trying to find the strength I'd used to fight the Minotaur, but it just wasn't there.

"Like he's 'Big Three' material," Clarisse said as she pushed me toward one of the toilets. "Yeah, right. Minotaur probably fell over laughing, he was so stupid looking."

Her friends snickered.

Annabeth stood in the corner, watching through her fingers. While Raven only smirked and mouthed me to me, 'it's going to be okay.

I mean how does bathing with toilet water ever going to be okay?

At least she managed to mouth the words, 'thank you' but I would very much appreciate it if she helps me.

Clarisse bent me over on my knees and started pushing my head toward the toilet bowl. It reeked like rusted pipes and, well, like what goes into toilets. I strained to keep my head up. I was looking at the scummy water, thinking, I will not go into that. I won't.

Then something happened. I felt a tug in the pit of my stomach. I heard the plumbing rumble, the pipes shudder. Clarisse's grip on my hair loosened. Water shot out of the toilet, making an arc straight over my head, and the next thing I knew, I was sprawled on the bathroom tiles with Clarisse screaming behind me.

I turned just as water blasted out of the toilet again, hitting Clarisse straight in the face so hard it pushed her down onto her butt. The water stayed on her like the spray from a fire hose, pushing her backward into a shower stall.

She struggled, gasping, and her friends started coming toward her. But then the other toilets exploded, too, and six more streams of toilet water blasted them back. The showers acted up, too, and together all the fixtures sprayed the camouflage girls right out of the bathroom, spinning them around like pieces of garbage being washed away.

As soon as they were out the door, I felt the tug in my gut lessen, and the water shut off as quickly as it had started.

The entire bathroom was flooded. Annabeth and Raven hadn't been spared. They was dripping wet, but they hadn't been pushed out the door. They were standing in exactly the same place; Annabeth stared at me in shock while Raven only grinned. I assumed that she knew that it was going to happen.

I looked down and realized I was sitting in the only dry spot in the whole room. There was a circle of dry floor around me. I didn't have one drop of water on my clothes. Nothing.

I stood up, my legs shaky.

Annabeth said, "How did you ..."

"I don't know."

We walked to the door. Outside, Clarisse and her friends were sprawled in the mud, and a bunch of other campers had gathered around to gawk. Clarisse's hair was flattened across her face. Her camouflage jacket was sopping and she smelled like sewage. She gave me a look of absolute hatred. "You are dead, new boy. You are totally dead."

I probably should have let it go, but I said, "You want to gargle with toilet water again, Clarisse? Close your mouth."

I heard a camera snapshot. It was Raven, howling with laughter at Clarrise and her friends. "This "she said, taking another shot "is sooo...going to be blackmail material." She said haughtily. Clarrise scowled at her and turned her attention to me. Glaring at me that made me shiver a little bit.

Her friends had to hold her back. They dragged her toward cabin five, while the other campers made way to avoid her flailing feet.

Annabeth stared at me. I couldn't tell whether she was just grossed out or angry at me for dousing at her. Raven approached us and was still giggling softly.

"Hmm..."Raven trailed off thinking, before whispering something to Annabeth's ear. She glanced at me and said, "Thanks by that way Perce, I was going to give you a strawberry sundae as a thank you gift but I ate it." She said. I preferred blueberries anyway.

The strawberry basket was lying around the ground somewhere and she didn't really care. She gave one last trademark smirk before muttering something in Greek that said, mystery solved or perhaps it was my sister is made of gold.

Annabeth continued to stare. "What?" I demanded, "what are you thinking and what did Raven say to you?"

"We want you on our team for capture the flag." She said.

Word of the bathroom incident spread immediately. Wherever I went, campers pointed at me and murmured something about toilet water. Or maybe they were just staring at Annabeth, who was still pretty much dripping wet.

Raven didn't speak much after that. She reasoned that she was only tagging along and left Annabeth with the tour. She looked bored and was muttering something about pizza most of the time.

Annabeth showed me a few more places: the metal shop (where kids were forging their own swords), the arts-and-crafts room (where satyrs were sandblasting a giant marble statue of a goat-man), and the climbing wall, which actually consisted of two facing walls that shook violently, dropped boulders, sprayed lava, and clashed together if you didn't get to the top fast enough.

Finally we returned to the canoeing lake, where the trail led back to the cabins.

"I've got training to do," Annabeth said flatly. "Dinner's at seven-thirty. Just follow your cabin to the mess hall."

"Annabeth, I'm sorry about the toilets."

"Hehehe...that was funny." Raven mumbled

"Whatever."

"It wasn't my fault."

She looked at me skeptically, and I realized it was my fault. I'd made water shoot out of the bathroom fixtures. I didn't understand how. But the toilets had responded to me. I had become one with the plumbing.

"You need to talk to the Oracle," Annabeth said.

"Who?"

"Not who. What. The Oracle. I'll ask Chiron."

I stared into the lake, wishing somebody would give me a straight answer for once.

I wasn't expecting anybody to be looking back at me from the bottom, so my heart skipped a beat when I noticed two teenage girls sitting cross-legged at the base of the pier, about twenty feet below. They wore blue jeans and shimmering green T-shirts, and their brown hair floated loose around their shoulders as minnows darted in and out. They smiled and waved as if I were a long-lost friend.

I didn't know what else to do. I waved back.

"Don't encourage them," Annabeth warned. "Naiads are terrible flirts."

"Yeah but they do make good entertainment if I convinced them to flirt with a Charlie while Silena is around. You should have seen his awkward face." Raven said. Annabeth ignored her and I ignored who Charlie and Silena were.

"Naiads," I repeated, feeling completely overwhelmed. "That's it. I want to go home now."

Annabeth frowned. "Don't you get it, Percy? You are home. This is the only safe place on earth for kids like us."

"Unless..." Raven trailed off. I stared at her and so did Annabeth. Raven shook her head giving us a never-mind-look.

"You mean, mentally disturbed kids?"

"You know, technically, he's right." Raven said.

Annabeth rolled her eyes and said, "I mean not human. Not totally human, anyway. Half-human."

"Half-human and half-what?" She gave Raven a look and they began speaking in Ancient Greek. I was surprised again that I was able to understand a bit of what they said;

_"Is he really that stupid?" _Annabeth said. I frowned at the insult.

_"He's clueless about everything. I swear his head is full of kelp."_

I wasn't able to get what they were saying after that, since they were conversing in Greek so fast that it was like a first language to them already.

Still I caught the words, 'spongbrain' from their short conversation.

"I think you know." Raven said to me in English.

I didn't want to admit it, but I was afraid I did. I felt a tingling in my limbs, a sensation I sometimes felt when my mom talked about my dad.

"God," I said. "Half-god."

Annabeth nodded. "Your father isn't dead, Percy. He's one of the Olympians."

"That's ... crazy."

"Is it? What's the most common thing gods did in the old stories? They ran around falling in love with humans and having kids with them. Do you think they've changed their habits in the last few millennia?"

"But those are just - " I almost said myths again. Then I remembered Chiron's warning that in two thousand years, I might be considered a myth. "But if all the kids here are half-gods - "

"Demigods," Annabeth said. "That's the official term. Or half-bloods."

"Then who's are your dads?" I asked to the both of them.

Annabeth's hands tightened around the pier railing. And Raven winced and stared at the lake. I got the feeling I'd just trespassed on a sensitive subject.

"My dad is a professor at West Point," she said. "I haven't seen him since I was very small. He teaches American history."

"And mine...is a megalomaniac, mass murderer." Raven deadpanned. I stared at her with my mouth opened in shock. I couldn't tell whether she was lying or exaggerating. I gave Annabeth a look and she gave me a 'don't ask' look in return.

"He abandoned me when I was a child." She said, painfully. Ravens back was facing me but I could tell that from her voice alone that she held a lot of disdain for the man. I would too.

"He's human?" I said changing the topic. Raven only snorted.

"What? You assume it has to be a male god who finds a human female attractive? How sexist is that?" Annabeth said.

"Who's your mom, then?"

"Cabin six."

"Meaning?"

Annabeth straightened. "Athena. Goddess of wisdom and battle."

"How bout yours?" I asked Raven who spun on her heel and face me.

"Apate. Goddess of the Mist and deception. And bunch of other titles."

Okay, I thought. Why not? And who the heck is Apate.

"You probably haven't heard of her." Raven said, as if reading my mind "Mom is a minor goddess and she doesn't appear in a lot of myths. She prefers to be hidden. Annabeth can explain to you later since I hate explaining." She groaned a little bit and Annabeth rolled her eyes.

"And my dad?"

"Undetermined," Annabeth said, "like I told you before. Nobody knows. Well, maybe her." She gestured to Raven.

I had a feeling that Raven does. I could tell from her all knowing smirk that was back again. "Will you tell me then?" I asked hopefully. Raven shook her head.

"Yeah, I want to know what's your conclusion too." Said Annabeth.

"Tsk. Tsk. Tsk..Annabeth, I expected more from you." She mocked scolded,"I would tell you, but I feel like this a secret that I'm keeping until later. Don't worry you'll find out soon Percy. Perhaps even on Friday."

It gave me a bit more assurance.

"Except my mother. She knew." I reminded them.

"Maybe not, Percy. Gods don't always reveal their identities."

"My dad would have. He loved her."

Annabeth gave me a cautious look. She didn't want to burst my bubble. "Maybe you're right. Maybe he'll send a sign. That's the only way to know for sure: your father has to send you a sign claiming you as his son. Sometimes it happens.

"You mean sometimes it doesn't?"

Annabeth ran her palm along the rail.

"The gods are busy. They have a lot of kids and they don't always ... Well, sometimes they don't care about us, Percy. They ignore us." Raven said, bitterly.

"I thought your mom was alright?" Annabeth asked.

"I'm not taking about my mom." She muttered silently, shoving her hands into the pocket of her shorts. Somehow, I noticed a small, cyndrical object underneath her shirt, tucked between her shorts. I wanted to ask what it was then my ADHD acted up and I thought about some of the kids I'd seen in the Hermes cabin, teenagers who looked sullen and depressed, as if they were waiting for a call that would never come. I'd known kids like that at Yancy Academy, shuffled off to boarding school by rich parents who didn't have the time to deal with them. But gods should behave better.

"So I'm stuck here," I said. "That's it? For the rest of my life?"

"It depends," Annabeth said. "Some campers only stay the summer. If you're a child of Aphrodite or Demeter, you're probably not a real powerful force. The monsters might ignore you, so you can get by with a few months of summer training and live in the mortal world the rest of the year. But for some of us, it's too dangerous to leave. We're year-rounders. In the mortal world, we attract monsters. They sense us. They come to challenge us. Most of the time, they'll ignore us until we're old enough to cause trouble - about ten or eleven years old, but after that, most demigods either make their way here, or they get killed off. A few manage to survive in the outside world and become famous. Believe me, if I told you the names, you'd know them. Some don't even realize they're demigods. But very, very few are like that."

"So monsters can't get in here?"

Annabeth shook her head. "Not unless they're intentionally stocked in the woods or specially summoned by somebody on the inside."

"Why would anybody want to summon a monster?"

"Practice fights." She said to which Raven added, snickering a bit, "Practical jokes."

"Practical jokes?" Raven chuckled.

"You should have seen Clarrise and the whole Ares cabin get attack by stymphilian birds" she said.

"I thought the Stoll's did that?" Annabeth asked looking at her.

"Who did you think gave them the idea?"

"Isn't that a bit mean. Travis and Connor were attacked by the entire Ares cabin for a week." Annabeth said wryly.

Raven scoffed,"Clarrise is a bully and so are most of her siblings."

I definitely agree with that. Wish I could have seen it though. Even though I don't know what stymphilian birds are.

"And plus, Travis and Connor spilled my strawberry sundae on purpose. Serves them right."

Our ADHD was acting up that we didn't realize that we were off topic. Annabeth was the only one who still remembered it.

"The point is, the borders are sealed to keep mortals and monsters out. From the outside, mortals look into the valley and see nothing unusual, just a strawberry farm." Said Annabeth.

"So ... you're a year-rounders?"

Annabeth nodded. She then pointed at Raven saying,"maybe not her."

"What do you mean?"

"I travel a lot and I'm mostly I'm not here at camp." Raven replied. From under the collar of Annabeths T-shirt she pulled a leather necklace with five clay beads of different colors. It was just like Luke's, except Annabeth's also had a big gold ring strung on it, like a college ring.

"I've been here since I was seven," she said."So was I." Raven added, Pulling out robe same leather necklace from underneath her orange t-shirt. "Every August, on the last day of summer session, you get a bead for surviving another year. We've been here longer than most of the counselors, and they're all in college." Annabeth said.

"Why did you both come so young?"

She twisted the ring on her necklace. "None of your business." And Raven muttered, "Nosy kid."

"Oh." I stood there for a minute in uncomfortable silence. "So ... I could just walk out of here right now if I wanted to?"

"It would be suicide, but you could, with Mr. D's or Chiron's permission. But they wouldn't give permission until the end of the summer session unless ..."

"Unless?"

"You were granted a quest. But that hardly ever happens. So far, only Raven and her brother, Tom is allowed to leave the camp whenever they feel like. They go on missions"

"More like dangerous errands" Raven scoffed, "I honestly never been on an errand that doesn't have some monster wanting to eat me."

"I honestly don't think that you should use the word, 'honestly'" Annabeth said haughtily. Raven scrunched her nose in mock annoyance. "anyways missions are kinda like quests except there is no prophecy involved. The last time ..."

Her voice trailed off. I could tell from her tone that the last time hadn't gone well.

"Back in the sick room," I said, "when you were feeding me that stuff -"

"Ambrosia."

"Yeah. You asked me something about the summer solstice."

Annabeth's shoulders tensed. "So you do know something?"

"Well... no. Back at my old school, I overheard Grover and Chiron talking about it. Grover mentioned the summer solstice. He said something like we didn't have much time, because of the deadline. What did that mean?"

She clenched her fists. "I wish I knew. Chiron and the satyrs, they know, but they won't tell me. Something is wrong in Olympus, something pretty major. Last time I was there, everything seemed so normal."

"You've been to Olympus?"

"Some of us year-rounders - Luke and Clarisse, Raven and I and a few others - we took a field trip during winter solstice. That's when the gods have their big annual council."

"But... how did you get there?"

"The Long Island Railroad, of course. You get off at Penn Station. EmpireStateBuilding, special elevator to the six hundredth floor." She looked at me like she was sure I must know this already. "You are a New Yorker, right?"

"Oh, sure." As far as I knew, there were only a hundred and two floors in the EmpireStateBuilding, but I decided not to point that out. Raven scoffed,"He's freaking clueless. I don't get why he blames you," she said and looked up, eyeing the sky.

"Umm...What is she talking about?" I asked Annabeth.

"Don't mind her. It takes time to get used to her cryptic way of talking." She replied.

"Right after we visited," Annabeth continued, "the weather got weird, as if the gods had started fighting. A couple of times since, I've overheard satyrs talking. The best I can figure out is that something important was stolen. And if it isn't returned by summer solstice, there's going to be trouble. When you came, I was hoping ... I mean - Athena can get along with just about anybody, except for Ares. And of course she's got the rivalry with Poseidon. But, I mean, aside from that, I thought we could work together. I thought you might know something."

I shook my head. I wished I could help her, but I felt too hungry and tired and mentally overloaded to ask any more questions.

"I've got to get a quest," Annabeth muttered to herself. "I'm not too young. If they would just tell me the problem ...why can't you take me with you Raven?"

Still looking up, Raven said,"Chirons orders. Oh and your mom said so."

Annabeth scrunched up her nose in annoyance, "since when did you follow rules?" Raven gave her another smirk, still looking up the sky. "The fates told me that you'd get your chance."

I could smell barbecue smoke coming from somewhere nearby. Annabeth must've heard my stomach growl. She told me to go on, she'd catch me later. I left her and Raven on the pier, tracing her finger across the rail as if drawing a battle plan. Raven however took a rock and skipped it, failing miserably.

Back at cabin eleven, everybody was talking and horsing around, waiting for dinner. For the first time, I noticed that a lot of the campers had similar features: sharp noses, upturned eyebrows, mischievous smiles. They were the kind of kids that teachers would peg as troublemakers. Thankfully, nobody paid much attention to me as I walked over to my spot on the floor and plopped down with my Minotaur horn.

The counselor, Luke, came over. He had the Hermes family resemblance, too. It was marred by that scar on his right cheek, but his smile was intact.

"Found you a sleeping bag," he said. "And here, I stole you some toiletries from the camp store."

I couldn't tell if he was kidding about the stealing part.

I said, "Thanks."

"No prob." Luke sat next to me, pushed his back against the wall. "Tough first day?"

"I don't belong here," I said. "I don't even believe in gods."

"Yeah," he said. "That's how we all started. Once you start believing in them? It doesn't get any easier."

The bitterness in his voice surprised me, because Luke seemed like a pretty easygoing guy. He looked like he could handle just about anything.

"So your dad is Hermes?" I asked.

He pulled a switchblade out of his back pocket, and for a second I thought he was going to gut me, but he just scraped the mud off the sole of his sandal. "Yeah. Hermes."

"The wing-footed messenger guy."

"That's him. Messengers. Medicine. Travelers, merchants, thieves. Anybody who uses the roads. That's why you're here, enjoying cabin eleven's hospitality. Hermes isn't picky about who he sponsors."

I figured Luke didn't mean to call me a nobody. He just had a lot on his mind.

"You ever meet your dad?" I asked.

"Once."

I waited, thinking that if he wanted to tell me, he'd tell me. Apparently, he didn't. I wondered if the story had anything to do with how he got his scar.

Luke looked up and managed a smile. "Don't worry about it, Percy. The campers here, they're mostly good people. After all, we're extended family, right? We take care of each other."

He seemed to understand how lost I felt, and I was grateful for that, because an older guy like him - even if he was a counselor - should've steered clear of an uncool middle-schooler like me. But Luke had welcomed me into the cabin. He'd even stolen me some toiletries, which was the nicest thing anybody had done for me all day.

I decided to ask him my last big question, the one that had been bothering me all afternoon. "Clarisse, from Ares, was joking about me being 'Big Three' material. Then Annabeth ... twice, she said I might be 'the one.' She said I should talk to the Oracle. What was that all about?"

Luke folded his knife. "I hate prophecies."

"What do you mean?"

His face twitched around the scar. "Let's just say I messed things up for everybody else. The last two years, ever since my trip to the Garden of the Hesperides went sour, Chiron hasn't allowed any more quests. Although, he doesn't mind when the Apate kids go in missions because they could easily escape here at camp. Plus the gods always seem to approach them first so Chiron couldn't help but say yes. Annabeth's been dying to get out into the world. She pestered Chiron so much he finally told her he already knew her fate. He'd had a prophecy from the Oracle. He wouldn't tell her the whole thing, but he said Annabeth wasn't destined to go on a quest yet. She had to wait until... somebody special came to the camp."

"Somebody special?"

"Don't worry about it, kid," Luke said. "Annabeth wants to think every new camper who comes through here is the omen she's been waiting for. Now, come on, its dinnertime."


End file.
